Below Orion’s sneakers, he could feel the crunch as the frozen blades of grass were broken. The sun just barely cleared the three story red white brick building as it kissed the football field. The glass walls of the high school lobby focused the sunlight on the field. Orion kept his gaze downward to shield his eyes from the sunlight; his hoodie kept the morning draft from biting him too badly. Nonetheless, Orion kept moving at a brisk pace to get out of the cold sooner. Although he was early for his first class, he enjoyed the peaceful walk in the morning before most students arrived.

As he made his way across the field, his eyes spotted a dark line across the ground. A long narrow shadow was cast in his direction as the stick that cast it protruded upright from the ground stood spotlighted by the morning sun. Orion kept walking, not paying much attention to it; however, as he got closer the stick glistened. The sunlight reflected off the stick almost looked like it was winking at him.

Wondering what kind of stick could reflect light, Orion walked up to the stick and bent down to examine it. Much to his surprise, it seemed to be made of metal. In fact it was so smooth and rose gold colored, he wondered if it wasn’t some sort of expensive piece of jewelry one of the rich kids had lost. As he squinted in the sunlight to see clearer, he found that there were fins on the top as if it was an arrow.

“Arrow shaped jewelry? I guess rich people have different tastes,” Orion thought, but he knew the right thing was to turn it into lost and found. “I suppose it might have sentimental value and be irreplaceable,” he rationalized as he bent down to pick the arrow up.

Immediately as soon as he touched the arrow, a thousand voices whispered in his mind. Each one was conveying different things. Some told him stories of gods while others spoke of eternity. Orion fell to the ground and knew that he was destined to go mad. The onslaught was more than just voices although that was enough to destroy anyone. As the voices spoke, they seemed to have a direct connection to his mind. It didn’t matter that he couldn’t hear any single word as they all overlapped with each other; the information they imparted was being imprinted on his mind with no relief in sight.

“Peace,” an overarching feminine voice commanded. Suddenly it all dulled down and faded away. All the stories, counsel, and details the voices spoke of faded from Orion’s mind leaving only a faded imprint. He had curled up on the ground by now and despite the return to normalcy, couldn’t quite muster the energy or courage to get back up. As he focused on taking breaths, he eventually found his sanity. By the time he opened his eyes, the sun had settled into its place in the sky and was firmly shining over him.

Orion looked around to see if the woman who saved him was still around. Seeing no one, he became more confused. He knew that he must have been on the floor for more than just a couple of minutes so perhaps she simply didn’t want to wait for him. Of course even that explanation hardly explained a tenth of what had occurred. Deciding that he needed a mental health day, he decided to get up and go home.

As he got up, he saw the arrow was still in the ground. “Nope. No way. It’s going to be someone else’s problem,” he thought. “But what if someone else experiences what I did? It’s dangerous to leave that lying around.” And yet he couldn't bring himself to touch the arrow again; the fear of having to suffer like that was quite strong. As Orion stood there deliberating, the arrow flew out of the ground.

Only the shock of something flying at him, could have made Orion do what he did next. Without thinking, Orion grabbed the arrow as it flew backwards at him. Instantly, as he touched the arrow again, he knew he was safe. No voices came to overwhelm him. Instead, he became filled with purpose. From within him, a singular voice spoke; it was genderless and without tone or inflection as only a soundless voice could produce.

“You hold within your hand an arrow of Cupid. Any instrument of the gods holds within it the ability to upset the balance of the world for both good and evil in equal stride. Only in the hands of a god can it be safely shielded from the world. If it were to be left alone in the mortal realm, death will follow without fail, for that is the price for any cosmic shift. So did Mother Flame and Father Aether decree and so has it been for all time.”

“If only gods can touch it, why am I holding it?” Orion nervously thought. As he stood there with the arrow in hand, he heard the sounds of a crowd of students. Not sure how much of the day he had missed, he suddenly realized he had no idea what time it was. As he listened to the students through the large floor to ceiling window of the school lobby, he realized that the school day must be over as the students were making their way from the classroom to their lockers and then exiting the building.

Orion wanted to get out of there, but he also felt drawn to the crowd. He desperately wanted some sense of normalcy and needed to talk to someone about all of this. He scanned the crowd and looked for a familiar face. As luck would have it, his best friend, Sarah, walked out of the school. He started to walk towards her when she spotted him and smiled and ran towards him. Still weak from his experience, Orion stopped and waited for her to get to him.

“Hey there stranger! Were you in class today? I didn’t see you in Geometry, “ Sarah smiled again as she approached him. She was always a positive bubbly person that seemed to embody joy itself. “What’s that in your hand?”

“Hey Sarah, man am I glad to see you, “ Orion started to say. “ This thing is -”

“Sharing even knowledge of the gods' tools is enough to disrupt the pendulum upon which we swing,” the voice of knowledge spoke once again stopping Orion from telling Sarah his tale. “The arrow must be returned to Cupid for the safety of all.”

“This thing is what?” Sarah asked. She watched Orion still smiling waiting for him to finish his thought.

“It’s…” Orion began, but still not sure what he was going to say.

“Hey Sarah, let’s go! Practice is starting!” Orion was interrupted again by a group of girls in cheerleader uniforms. They were standing on the side of the football field. “Coach wants us to do a few warm up laps around the field before we head back into the gym.”

“Ugh, I’ll catch up with you after. Will you hang out and wait for me to finish practice? We can walk home together.” Sarah asked. Her smile suddenly faded as she said, “There’s something I need to talk about.”

“Um, sure.” Orion agreed as he didn’t really know what he’d do even if he was to head home right now. It wasn’t like Cupid would be in his living room. He also thought it would be good to sit down some more before moving too much. Orion slipped the arrow in his backpack.

As Orion headed into the school lobby to sit down, he watched the cheerleaders start their lap around the field. By the time he settled himself on the benches in the lobby, two very cold cheerleaders had finished their laps and walked into the lobby. They sat on the benches across on the other side of the lobby as they waited for their teammates to finish.

“So he did it in the middle of biology? What an asshole!” One of them asked. Neither of them paid much attention to Orion, only focusing on warming themselves up and chatting with each other.

“Yea he’s a tool for sure. Poor Sarah. No one deserves to be dumped publicly like that, least of all a sweetheart like her”

“Let’s take her out after practice and cheer her up.”

“Great idea! Let’s go tell coach we need to end practice early”

The two cheerleaders ran back outside. As the doors opened, a cold gust of wind from the outside hit Orion, but he didn’t mind. He couldn’t believe Sarah’s boyfriend would do something like that to her. Another gust of wind slapped Orion’s face and he noticed the doors didn’t close. He got up to close the door. As he reached the door, he could see the coach talking to the team. It seemed like she was letting the team skip practice completely.

Orion stood by the door watching the girls gather their things and head to the parking lot and their cars. Only Sarah was heading towards him. She jogged her way across the field and quickly reached the doors. Orion opened the door for her so she could get out of the cold quickly.